IBM (News - Alert), a provider of software solutions, has announced it will provide extension of Lotus Notes and Domino collaboration software for a range of mobile and Web-connected devices such as the Apple (News - Alert) iPhone, Nokia smartphones, thin clients, laptops and desktops.

 

The company will make Lotus Domino Designer tools available at no charge to initiate growth of Lotus Notes and Domino applications for the increasingly diverse range of devices in corporate use.

 

The first application to offer support to the iPhone (News - Alert) will be Lotus Domino 8.5.1, which will be accessible through Lotus Notes Traveler software. So, the advanced features of Lotus Domino such as automatic synching for e-mail, contacts and calendar data will now be available to the iPhone users too, as more and more of them now need to access Notes and Domino collaboration software on the road.

 

According to a speculation by the IBM Institute for Business Value, two billion people shall be accessing the Web through mobile in the next decade, which indicates a significant shift in the way the majority of people interact with the Web.

 

The applications will be enabled with several enhanced features for the iPhone users, such as push e-mail, contacts and calendar. Besides working off-line, the users will be able to erase the confidential data in a remote mode if an iPhone is lost or stolen. This feature comes in as a wonderful safety measure for the corporate users, for whom security of the crucial data is of great concern.

 

Apart from this, the iPhone users can also take advantage of a corporate directory look-up feature which helps them find contact information behind their company firewall.

 

The company has announced a number of updates for the Nokia (News - Alert) Symbian platform as well. These updates are remote wipe, device lock, password management and external calendar integration. Also, all of these capabilities are going to be offered for Windows Mobile devices as well by IBM.

 

Lotus Notes and Domino have now become the applications supporting the vast majority of smartphones in the world, offering compatibility to the iPhone, Nokia Symbian, Windows Mobile devices, and Research In Motion, or “RIM” BlackBerry (News - Alert).

 

According to Kevin Cavanaugh, Vice President, Messaging and Collaboration, IBM, the company is accelerating the delivery of millions of existing Lotus Domino applications to mobile users, and promoting the creation of a variety of new ones to help people work smarter on the go.

 

Cavanaugh also said that no charge Domino Designer will make it easier for organizations to adopt, acquire and manage IBM Lotus Notes and Domino software, and proliferate the development of powerful, new business apps for Lotus Notes and Domino.

 

Recently, IBM announced plans to offer new service and support for BlackBerry Smartphone deployments that cut down the cost of managed services and support for BlackBerry Enterprise Solution by 30 percent than traditional solutions.

 

In October 2009, the company announced two analytics-focused research projects in India and Israel that will help telecom service providers and e-retailers improve customer service and new-customer acquisitions.